As many of the island’s galleries prepare to shut their doors for the summer we caught up with Hayfa Aljishi, managing director and curator of Bahrain’s Al Bareh Gallery, which will be holding an ongoing exhibition right the way through Ramadan, to find out what’s on offer.

What will Al Bareh be featuring over the summer?
Albareh will be featuring a collection of artworks by a group of artists that are represented by the gallery.

Is the Summer Collection something you do every year or is this the first time?
It has been a common practice for us to show each summer some of the artworks that were shown throughout the year in the curated shows and exhibitions at Albareh.

How were the featured artists chosen and can you tell us a bit more about a few of them?
This time we are showing, for the first time, the works of two additional Bahraini artists, Kady Matter as well as Zuhair Saeed, a former winner of the Zain Dream art competition.

The works we show are selected to give the best representation of the style of each artist as well as give the audience a sample of what Albareh has as a collection. This is crucial as we aim to help private collectors to build a solid portfolio of Middle East artworks.

Are there any artists who are particularly popular with Bahrain’s art lovers?
The artists that are showing this summer are, for example, Algerian artist Hamza Bunoua, Bahraini artists Ebrahim BuSaad, who has shown at the Sheikh Ebrahim Centre, and Mohammed AlMahdi, Saudi artist Hussain AlMohasen, and Hassan Meer.

What do you have coming up in the second half of the year?
There will be two exhibitions to end this year and we have preferred to concentrate on the Bahraini talent. The first one will be in late September, titled ‘Taqaseem’ and will include four Bahraini artists. The second exhibition will be for a female bahraini artist to be announced soon.